Coyote Among Wolves
by Senket
Summary: Percy expresses his feelings about his relationship with his family. Oliver hurts, but sometimes he doesn't have the most sensible mouth. Family matters, but feeling are hard to understand. Poor coping skills abound.


Who would've thought after all this time I'd finally write a Percival story? Ah well. So named because wolves are pack animals, while coyotes are loners, but they reside in the same geographical areas and are closely related. Yus? Written in, oh, the past ten minutes, so I expect the grammar is repetitive and somewhat lacking. I hope it makes sense.

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Large, round eyes watched line of rainwater work their way down the window, long, thin fingers pressing against pocketed glass. Oliver thought he saw a shiver trace up the boy's arm, but it was hard to 'd seen the redhead like this before: listless, distant, closed. It was not so rare to see him this way in their double room, as long as the boy wasn't studying or reading. Percy, Oliver was sorry to say, really did not feel close to many. And here he was, again, alone. "Something wrong, Perce," he asked softly, biting his lip lightly when the other Gryffindor shook.

He did not except a quick reply, nor did he receive one. Oliver watched for a few moments before sitting on his bed, pulling off his shoes, next his guards, tossing his socks into the nearby hamper. He pulled lanky legs up on the bed, refixing bright, inquisitive eyes on his distant roommate. Eventually Percy turned away, moved to his own bed, sat, and never once looked the sportsman in the eye. "You're an only child, Oliver."

"That I am, yes," he answered, and winced at the unintended volume the words seem to carry compared to the other's frail, papery voice.

"Have you ever thought what's it's like, to have- you know."

Oliver had been the little boy in stories that ran around asking his mother for a baby brother every Christmas. He'd never been quite that lucky, but Hogwarts had given him the gift his parents could never have afforded; dozens of younger students to protect, dozens more he could go to for favors, for entertainment, to teach him everything. Percy- a jewel, not that the boy knew- was the only that fit both categories. Nobody knew but Oliver. But now, more than ever, he felt Percy needed his protection. "I don't think I need to. Fred and George ARE on my team, after all." He smiled crookedly, leaning forward, but Percy did not look up. He did, however, bark a short, dry laugh, and the Keeper felt goosebumps break out across his biceps. "...Perce?"

"And have you ever thought what's it's like..." The thin boy's shoulders caved and Oliver's fingers curled into a fist reflexively. His first instinct was always to find whoever had made one of his 'little siblings' cry and give them a nice shiner for it, even if he very rarely followed through. He didn't think it would help, with Percy, anyway. He'd probably hate it, and retreat farther into his shell. He waited, even as he watched the pale redhead tense further, watched him half-gag on his own throat, fight the hot, thick tears that were threatening to boil over now that he'd opened his mouth.

It took several long minutes, thick and tense, Oliver's fingers twitching, itching, feet wanting to propel, and a wise enough mind to stay still, chaining himself down. He almost spoke several times but killed the instinct swiftly.

Percy stated again slowly, voice low and soft but barely controlled. "Wondered what it's like to have 5 brothers and a sister in a family everyone knows about- oh the Weasley's! They're-" and his voice broke there, one heaving (heart-wrenching) sob, and Percy stopped again for several moments, white fingers fluttering like pinned dragonflies where they were trapped between knobby knees. "So close! You won't find a better family-" he sank further, forehead on his knees, and stayed for another long minute. Oliver was surprised that he wasn't crying himself.

Percy started again several times, and stopped before he could finish his first word. And then, almost as though he had run out of tears, voice husk-dry and skin-pricklingly cool: "Middleish of seven in a family that accepts Harry Potter and Hermione Granger as their own in no time, and no place to belong."

Time stretched. Percy moved as normally now, standing to move back to the window. He did not look at the Keeper, nor did he move to wipe at the tracks of tears on swollen cheeks.

Oliver, in all this time of forced silence and stifled worry, froze involuntarily for the first time. At first, it would just not sink in, and then in a rush, he remembered. The thousand conversations he'd had with every Weasley about holidays, meals where Percy would disappear into the library, when the others were out with snowballs and the other was on the balcony above them, when he'd seen them all at Quiddich games and Percy leaving a meter of distance even while the stands were packed.

The twins made mean jokes about how Percy didn't want to be a part of them, and.

"But- When you made head boy, and your mum was going on about-"

"Don't be daft," he answered with a quiet indifference, fingers tugging at tight orange curls, "you'd say that to any child you had. It doesn't do well to play favorites."

Percy didn't feel loved.

It had never even occurred to him.

Never. The Weasleys, not accepting their own? It felt ridiculous. He supposed that was his point.

"Why don't you... tell them?"

Percy's face turned white in a flash, eyes wide as he turned to look at this stranger that had appeared in Oliver Wood in the last few seconds. "What? Tell them WHAT? 'Mummy, I'm sorry I always seem like such a spoilsport, as your sons are so fond of reminding me, but I just feels like no one WANTS me here, that's all!' " Despite his tenuous efforts at control, his voice was breaking into hysterics, thick with a lifetime of smothered agony. "Can't you fix that?!"

He stood, trembling, and stared at Oliver Wood, and felt ill as wide, pained (was that pity?) eyes stared back at him, and broke again altogether. The tears were obvious, now, unrestrained, soaking into his collar, and Oliver felt a full-body numbness, fear and an echo of Percy's pain choking him. He did not go on until his glasses were misted, voice loud, sharp, almost cruel in its angry agony. "So when we graduate, and I go to the ministry- for some worthless job, no doubt, no matter how hard I try- and I see them less and less, they won't say 'oh Percy we miss you, can you come home for supper tonight,' or even 'Percy, come home once in a while why don't you'? No." He was half laughing through his sobs, high and frail. "They'll hate me, say I never wanted to be part anyway, just wait. JUST WAIT."

Oliver, in the future, never wouldn't been able to remember what had made him snap in Percy's words. Maybe the way he, in his own sullen insecurities, was sullying his family without realizing it, or the heady, murdering fear he saw pronounced in every movement, but the only way to keep from breaking was to yell back, even as his own tears welled out. "Maybe that's because you're always pushing them away, you git! Who really started it? You sound like you're spouting off on a lot of self-fulfilling prophesies, do you even know what you're saying?!"

Percy froze first, hot, flushed face turning ashen white; Oliver followed, horror dawning with realization. He took a step back, half expecting the frail boy to explode at him. Percy back away from Oliver without taking his eyes off him until his back met the cold wall. He sank on the spot, pulling his legs in to him, and curled into the tightest, most pathetic ball Oliver had seen in his life, shaking with a new wave of sobs.

It looked like Percy wouldn't belong in either category now. Oliver had just killed his only connection with the young man- the young man that had finally managed to reveal his true, deepest pain to him. Oliver went to him, reached for him, but when rough fingers came in contact with a shaking shoulder, the lone Weasley flinched away, whimpering softly. The keeper jerked back, staring at his own fingers, then his roommate, then... nothing at all, still feeling the cold of tears against his cheek.

Now Percy had no family at all, in his own head or not.

Oliver Wood had always had an empathic gift, but he never thought it could hurt quite this much.


End file.
